Happy Induction stories anyone?

[Hooliaaa]

My first baby is now 9 days overdue and seems very happy and cosy where she is. I want to get my head round the increasing likeliehood that I'll be induced at 42 weeks. This is quite a different scenario to the 'relax at home' ideas I'd had about labour. Does anyone have some stories about easy happy inductions?

Thanks

I was induced with DD1 and it wasn't that awful because as soon as I knew it was going to happen I realised what I had wanted for my perfect birth was not necessarily going to happen so just opened my mind to the fact that anything and everything I had wanted to avoid could happen. I was given the first pessary at 9am and told to walk as much as possible once they had finished their iniital monitoring, we walked for hours, went bakc at 1 pm for another dose and check I had progressed too far for another dose but not far enough for ARM. Walk, went for lunch back at 5 for anther check, they broke my waters, still no pain things stalled and due to being induced for a bleed they wanted to start the drip sooner than normally, I opted for an epidural before the drip was connected. Got the epi, slept for 5 hours, woke up 10cm and DD1 was born after 15 minutes pushing, small tear, 5 stitches. We were on the ward 2 hours later and home the next day.

Thanks for this blueberryboybaitonSafari. I'm still here. Grrrrrr. I like the walking tips. I too am getting my head round envisaging a different birth experience. Fingers crossed it goes smoothly. I'm a wimp when it comes to tubes but pre-drip epidural tip sounds sensible. You're not the only person I've heard recommend this.

If I thought about it I may be slightly annoyed by how thick they lay on the 'relax at home and don't come into hospital til you're 8cm dilated' and then it all goes out the window at 42 weeks. But not worth getting annoyed really. I will focus on being excited about meeting this shy baby and thankful that she's still healthy in there.

I was induced with DS. The pessaries did nothing so I "wasted" the time from the wednesday morning to the thursday night being bored stiff as I wasn't allowed off the ward as I had sky high BP (hence being induced!)

The at midnight they broke my waters and put me onto the drip - DS was born at 5am. I only needed gas and air and found it nowhere near as bad as I thought it would having listened to to many horror stories!

Good luck!

Also - for anyone else looking at this 'Induced tomorrow any tips' has LOADS of helpful advice.

I think one advantage to being induced with your first baby is that you don't have another birth to judge it against! Everyone says induction is more painful but I've got no idea whether that's true as both mine were induced and it was fine really, no worse than I expected it'd be. Hope that makes sense!

I second blueberryboy, as often as they'll let you off the monitoring, get up and walk, walk, walk! If nothing else it'll stave off the boredom :) Try sideways up and down stairs like a crab, apparently it helps to get things going. Good luck!

The worst bit of my induction was being in hospital for 2 nights before I went into labour - I was a patient but felt like a visitor. The monitoring in the middle of the night was a nuisance too - but necessary. With regards to the labour, I don't know if the induction speeded things up ( I wasn't on the drip) but it was quick - can't complain at all about the labour / after care, just took a long time to get there. Better than sitting at home waiting and worrying though.